I was pre-planning the move with the layout going into its permanant home and while looking at it I was wondering how does some one finish the sides of the layout, I don’t want to be looking at 4 inches of white foam all the way around my layout thats for sure?
All ideas will be greatly valued.
Thanks, Jess.
Seems like most people use Masonite. I don’t much care for Masonite because it scuffs and mars very easily. I’ve often wondered why more people don’t use formica or some similar product. If feasible, it sure would look better.
It depends alot on the constrction method of your bench work Jess.
For my layout i simply secured hardboard to the ends of the bearers that sit across the L girders. The screw heads were then simply filled before painting. If you look to the left in the picture, you’l hopefully see what i mean. The picture is one from my layout in its early days.
In some places I use painted masonite with exposed finish screws and elsewere I extend the scenery down a ways. I use cloth skirts from the scenery to the floor unless the scenery goes to the floor. Some pics.
Go to Lowes, Home Depot, or whatever similar store you have nearby and tell them you want to look at Vinyl Wall Base.
It is very flexible, you can cut it with a razor knife or even scissors, and it comes in a gazillion colors. They will probably have black, brown, and grey in stock. You can order many other colors.
I use it in black to line my tunnels.
I just smooth out the imperfections in the foam with vinyl spackle, sand and paint it. Use only vinyl spackle as it stays flexible and sticks better to foam than plaster and other spackling compounds, which makes it less likely to crack or chip. 
Awesome!!!
Mike
I’m doing painted Masonite like a lot of others.
I recently saw pics of a narrow gauge layout that was AWESOME!! They finished the lower part kind of like Perry1060 did, but they stained the wood to look like an old, grey weathered shed. It had fascia style lighting above that was also weathered grey with a rusty corrugated tin roof over it. It REALLY looked like an old narrow gauge building surrounding the layout!
I can’t find the site again though![banghead]
Edit-Here! I found a pic of it. I don’t know who’s layout this is??
Wow, so many choices, now I must deside what to finish my sides in, I do love the wood looks, hummm, Being Native maybe I’ll use deer hide…just kidding, that would cost a lot of wampum!!!
Great ideas from everyone, thanks guys!
Happy Rails!
I use 1/8" Masonite hardboard painted black and secured with wallboard screws:
My staging yard has raised walls made of foamcore board painted the same black.
I believe that a lot of people use a material like masonite because of it’s flexibility in conforming to the rounded corners of an irregular shaped layout. However if your layout’s edge is all straight lines, there is nothing to prevent you from using something more substantial.
I’ve done masonite, and didn’t like it because sometimes it gets to be too wavy, especially in high-humidity situations. For my current permanent layout I used a salvaged piece of door jamb, that is nominally 1 X 4 in size. It gives me a good substantial edge that will stand up to a lot of punishment.
The other thing you are going to have to decide is whether you want to mount the siding flush with the top of your scenery, or raise it a fraction of an inch or so. So as to keep errant locomotives and pieces of rolling stock from taking the plunge into the Great Canyon of Doom.
For the old section, foam on a wood frame, I used 1/4" plywood for most of my fasica:
For the new section, foam on brackets with no frame, I used plastic strips (cut from For Sale signs), glued to the edge of the foam:
Nick
I use WHITE ICE paneling for fascia board, and profile the layout edge with contours, to break away from the running along the edges look.
I used Oak on my PRR layout. I’l probably continue the theme on my Rock Ridge Layout. I like the look.
Dude your layout looks AWESOME. That also happens to be the exact fascia that i’m considering using on my layout (vs. Spacemouse’s oak. decisions, decisions…), as well as what I believe Tony Koester used on his Coal Fork Extension.
More pictures!!!
That vinyl wall base sounds interesting. I used a cheaper but uglier equivalent: recycled plastic garden edging
More at this forum post
I like the rugged look, it is extremely hard, and any scuffs and marks don’t show up on the already roughened surface
I love these guys layout. My wallpaper on my laptop is of their heisler crossing the bridge. Type in logging layouts in yahoo search and you should be able to find it again. I beleive they are from germany.
for the facia i used oak with teak inlays the bottoms and sides i used walnut sliding doors so i can get under it i would like show pic’s of it , but i can’t seem to post pictures on this furum not to sure how do it .
1/8" masonite for me, works in my situation.:
Terry
